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This individual Report The Canadian Credit Card Market: Tough Sledding is available for purchase. This Report is available to members of Mercator Advisory Group’s Credit Advisory Service. Please be advised that this Report is normally part of a research and advisory service that provides ongoing support throughout the year. As such, this Report contains significant depth of content that is selected for its strategic importance to our members. (For a description of these services, see our Advisory Services section).

While the Report represents significant analyst time invested, there is no means of our ascertaining if it will fully meet your specific intended purposes. Typically, these Reports form the basis for future discussions with our clients where we are able to fine-tune additional information that we have gathered in the construction of the series of Reports (or locate new information rapidly due to our exclusive focus on gathering information in the payments industry) for specific member needs.

Unfortunately, in fairness to our paying members, we are not able to offer this level of support for a single Report purchase. We will, however, credit any Research Document purchase against the future purchase price of the service should you become a member within 30 days of purchasing the document.

The Canadian Credit Card Market: Tough Sledding

Research Describes Challenges in the Canadian Credit Card Issuing Market

Boston, MA -- The credit card market in Canada has long been the focus of intense competition among the leading Canadian banks, with the plethora of reward programs providing evidence of their non-stop battle to motivate usage.In the harsher current economic climate, have they perhaps overdone it?

Mercator Advisory Group's new report The Canadian Credit Card Market: Tough Sleddingexamines the relative positioning in Canada of the major card networks, and takes a closer look at the activities of the top 15-20 card issuers.We examine the strategies intended to increase card account numbers, as well as those intended to increase utilization rates on cards outstanding.

"The events of the past year have significantly unsettled the credit card market in Canada.The level of competition for customer accounts has been increased by both new entrants and the legalization of dual network-branded issuing.At the same time, the economic recession is driving up household debt levels as well as card delinquencies and write-offs.Factoring in the cost of rewards programs, some card issuers will struggle to preserve profitability in the near term," states Patricia McGinnis, Director in Mercator Advisory Group's Banking Group.

Highlights of this report include:

The "Big Five" Canadian banks hold leadership positions in this market, but they continue to be challenged by second tier domestic financial firms, by the Canadian subsidiaries of major foreign banks, and by card market entrants from the retail sector, including most recently the new Walmart Bank Canada.

To preserve profitability and avoid excessive losses in the current macro-economic environment, lenders must recalibrate most existing credit models and develop new strategies to respond to credit deterioration.

Dual-issuing is now allowed, and some issuers are already taking the bait.In a market already so saturated, we do not believe that simply issuing a new card of the "other" network will significantly change market positioning.

Among the leading Canadian banks, CIBC has built a volume of business significantly more than proportional to the bank's asset size in its market.

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About Mercator Advisory GroupMercator Advisory Group is the leading, independent research and advisory services firm exclusively focused on the payments and banking industries. We deliver pragmatic and timely research and advice designed to help our clients uncover the most lucrative opportunities to maximize revenue growth and contain costs. Our clients range from the world's largest payment issuers, acquirers, processors, merchants and associations to leading technology providers and investors.